


Wild Hearts

by GreenAngelHeart



Category: Good Girls (TV)
Genre: Continuation of 1x10, F/M, Threats of Violence, Unresolved Sexual Tension, canon compatible, emotions trying to break free
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-07-27
Packaged: 2019-06-17 03:48:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15452706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenAngelHeart/pseuds/GreenAngelHeart
Summary: “What, you ain’t never held a gun before, mama?” Rio said, his tone taunting, head cocked to one side, dark eyes boring straight through her flesh and bone be damned.





	Wild Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my tumblr - slightly expanded, hopefully improved! Same disclaimers remain from that:  
> So a number of disclaimers here, it’s been years since I wrote a fanfic, but that cliffhanger has kept clawing at my brain. You can all blame @wonwonron for one making me watch the show by reblogging gifs, and two basically forcing me to write this fic after telling her I had started writing a fic. Also I need more fic for this pairing so I don’t have to go through the trauma of writing it myself TRAUMA. Hoping this isn’t wildly OOC. Oh and yeah, I know nothing about gangs, guns, and I’m not American so apologies for the mention of trousers - could change it to pants but hey what you gonna do *shrugs* Oh and paragraphs are but an abstract idea to me :)

“What, you ain’t never held a gun before, mama?” Rio said, his tone taunting, head cocked to one side, dark eyes boring straight through her flesh and bone be damned.

Her hand quivered as she thought back to the gun she had taken from that kid laying bloody in her little girl’s bed. The cold weight of that in her hand as she had hidden it away under a stack of towels in the linen closet. No, it wasn’t the first time she’d held a gun. It wouldn’t even be the first time she had a shot a gun when it came to it, casting her mind back to that time in college when Dean and her, and a group of friends had gone to a shooting range as a lark. Her aim that day had been laughable, but that had been ok, the rush of feeling the power of the gun discharge at the time had been plenty to thrill her. She shivered at the memory of it now, if she was to accomplish what Rio now demanded of her she would need her aim to be true this time. And when all was said and done it certainly wasn’t the first time she had seriously thought about shooting a man, remembering how for a split second she had wished that toy gun she had pointed at Boomer’s head had been real. She was tired. Tired of the world using her, disposing of her, eating her up and spitting her out. 

She was brought back to the present by the sound of a chair being pushed back along the hard floor as Rio steadily rose from the table. “Times tickin' darlin’,” he said massaging the side of his jaw where Dean had obviously been able to get a punch in.  
Beth brought up her other hand to try and steady the weight of Rio’s gleaming gold gun, just like she had seen countless characters do on TV and in film and fought with herself to stem the continuing track of tears down her cheeks. She tried to keep the gun locked on him as he walked around the table towards her, “your aim’s ‘bout a foot off too,” his signature smirk fading from his lips as he came to stand in front of her, mere millimetres now from the barrel of the gun. He paused there, appraising her with that all too familiar sweep of his eyes. What did he see, Beth wondered for what was probably the thousandth time? Up this close she could really see every distinct abrasion that marred his face. She had no idea Dean had that in him. She guessed they really had been surprising each other a lot lately. Rio’s eyes didn’t so much as blink as she twisted her upper body, raising her arms further, so that the gun pointed up and over Rio’s shoulder towards where Dean was still sitting, his own face wet with tears, mouth agape in shock, or horror? Beth wasn’t sure. She steadied herself.

“Get out Dean” she hissed, “now!”

Now he definitely looked horrified. “What?!” he replied, “I’m not leaving you here with him.” Maybe that was the noblest thing Dean had said to her in years, but it didn’t undo any of the damage he’d already done.  
She doubled down on keeping her expression firm, hard towards him, “I know,” she spat out, “that you were faking it, the cancer, that it’s all just another lie. I want you to leave now,” she hoped that now her voice brooked no tone for discussion. Apparently, it didn’t. Dean slowly rose from where he was seated, and hobbled towards the backdoor, before trying one last time, “Beth…” but she cut him off with a harsh, “out now Dean!”

As the sound of the door closing behind him disturbed the otherwise quiet of the house, Beth let out a large exhale. No matter how she felt about Dean, she was so relieved he was gone, that he at least would there for the kids should the unspeakable happen. Rio hadn’t moved through all of that, still standing stock still no more than an arm’s length away from her. She returned to her previous position keeping her arms deliberately outstretched so that the cold round metal barrel of the gun grazed a path horizontally across Rio’s chest as she went. To Beth’s surprise his arms came up, his hands covering hers where they still gripped the gun. 

“You have to really commit, you feel me?” his voice rumbled through her, “you don’t wanna mess up, ‘less you want ‘em to suffer,” his hands warm and large tightening over hers, his body actually leaning into her, increasing the pressure against the point of the gun, forcing her to really lock her elbows to stop him crashing bodily into her. She worked to stifle the sobs that threatened to overcome her again. 

Finally, she found her voice again, “silencer?” she questioned. Chin jutting out, she remembered how that first time one of Rio’s men had calmly screwed on the addition to his gun. Surely Rio didn’t expect her to bring the full attention of the whole neighbourhood upon herself before she’s had a chance to come up with a plan of escape, or explanation for the police. Is that what this would mean for her? A life on the run. She pulled in another shaky breath.  
Rio’s smirk was back, his dark eyes flashing, crinkling at the corners as his smile grew even wider in amusement, or maybe really it was an indication of his bemusement at this little game of wills he was playing with a suburban housewife, “now you’re thinkin’ mama.” 

So cocksure Beth thought, her urge to shoot increasing, or was that her urge to fulfil some other base instinct that had been haunting her these past months. But was that an unfair description for those flashes of something that sometimes flared between them. The undercurrent of desire mingled with a mutual respect. It made her feel like she wasn’t past it, like she had something to offer, put that she had the power to take too. Beth was almost one hundred percent sure that Rio felt too in that tilt of his mouth into a half smile, his knowing eyes that seemed to grow darker every time she’d seen him, or she had been until that moment where he had hung her out to dry. She really hadn’t seen it coming, hadn’t expected it. She thought they had an understanding. A fragile trust that bridged the gap between gangbanger and suburban housewife against the odds.  
He nodded and let one hand drop from where he was holding hers firmly and produced a slender silver cylinder, eyebrows quirked, he offered it to her. She glanced at it, but her hands were either unable or unwilling to relax their grasp on his gun. Rio tutted, actually tutted at her, lips brought down into a fake pout, “oh honey I thought this is what you wanted, to finish it, to finish me”, he laughed again then dropped his voice to the lowest of whispers, almost a caress over her skin, “You have to be able to do what it takes to protect yours Elizabeth.”

She felt her wild heart beat for completely different reasons than terror at her name rolling off his tongue like that echoed around her head. One-handed he twisted the gun from out of her grasp, she instinctively flinched away, but Rio just studied it briefly as if he’d never seen it before, then tucked it back into the waistband of his trousers, that same look on his face, his eyes as unreadable as they were that fateful night he told her to go back home for good. 

“The kid, he knew too much about what is important, real to me right?” speaking as if it pained him to do so, he tipped his head back impatiently, though impatient with himself or her Beth wasn’t sure. His eyes suddenly cleared as the bored into hers as if he could transmit the information telepathically to her without the grief of having to say the actual words, if only she would understand. “I had to know,” now he was all too easy to read, and almost seemed vulnerable to attack. Just like that Beth understood, the kid knew who she was, where she could be found, how far up to her neck she was with Rio and his activities. She paled as she realised. The test wasn’t just about Rio and his business, it had been about her too. Seeing how much had been spilt about her. And maybe not just to the FBI, but god knows what kind of people Rio associates with. “I was foolish ok,” Rio was continuing, “who knew a lady like you with a mamavan…” he trailed off with a dry laugh, his eyes softening almost imperceptibly, but Beth knew his eyes, knew every line of his face now. And that word foolish reverberated between them. He thought he’d been foolish in letting her get close, but he hadn’t just let her, she had practically forced herself into his world. She’d been foolish too in playing this game, but she couldn’t find it in herself to have any regrets. She reached to touch him, just one touch, just to satisfy the itch, but with the reflexes of a seasoned predator he’d pulled his gun again and had it pointed at her.

“I thought I had asked you never to point that gun at me ever again,” Beth refused to be cowed now, not now he had all but admitted what she meant to him.

“Yeah and I asked you to go home to your kids,” he shrugged in response, his mask of indifference back in place as he stepped further into Beth’s space, so close that she could no longer make out the tattoo on his neck clearly. He leant in so that he could whisper directly into her ear, his hot breath washing over her. “I’m tellin’ you again, return to your life sweetheart,” he managed to make the term of endearment sound like something dirty in his mouth, then he gently traced the hollow of her right cheek with the end of his gun. If she turned her head to the left now she could mimic his movements, tracing the bruises of the face. She could kiss him if she wanted he was that close. But why would she want that. 

Gently she drew a fingertip over the redness on his jaw.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed!


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